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Not specifically talking about Byjus here - but look at some of those celebrities roped in by these growing companies - make really dumb, annoying, non-creative ads and rope in awkward-in-front-of-the-camera celebrities and sportspeople, get them to do a silly jig that has no emotions or grace or concept and keep pounding the audience with it at every break. Surely, you could hire better creative ad makers (doesn't have to be the top ones) and cut back on the cost you incur by getting celebrities on?

Speaking of which, the general creativity in the advertisement space seems to have gone down badly - most of ads these days are cringeworthy or downright substandard. I thought ad-film makers were paid well and the most creative people around. Why these cheap, uninteresting ads then?

That's because those ads work. Advertising in India is largely driven by Bollywood and Cricket and those ads work better for the mass-market, target audience than the ones that win Cannes Lions.

Speaking of ads, similarities between Byju's and another education related business from long ago. Anyone remember IIPM? :) Both had the same celebrity as a brand ambassador too!

Some companies that made ads with SRK:

LML
DHFL
Dish TV
Foodpanda
Nokia
Videocon
Jet Airways

Many of these got bankrupt! lol:

Ha ha, I will say Good luck. In this current climate, he will be lucky to raise a third of it. But there are too many gullible investors out there, so not impossible. Also it is a white elephant now, too much money is sunk in it. Now it's too big to fail.

Another darling of the investors, Meesho is facing fund crunch and will raise it's next round at much smaller valuation. BTW they closed their grocery business and laid off 300 people. At the same time, they roped in 7 celebrities to shill their Sale event. Where's the logic in these decisions?

Meesho Lays Off 300 Employees as Company Shuts Down Grocery Business; Know Reason

Meesho ropes in celebs to push five-day mega sale beginning Sept 23

Kind of adds to the thought that there is lot of money being circulated. He will get his money anyway, , business be damned. We have already heard about the quality of coaching they provide, and the business tactics used.

From what I have heard, if you can afford it, anyone of them will drop in to your kid brothers wedding to "wish" him.

I know the top tech honcho of a VC fund very closely. Listening to this person talk about their investment philosophy, it is not too off target to think that they don't have a clue about what they are doing both technically and financially. Basically, they are throwing darts at a wall and see what sticks. They look for some product with a couple of customers signed up (payment to come later with a bunch of clauses) and the "background" of the founders aka old boys network. These startups recognize the revenue upfront and boost up valuations and claim X-times growth!!! Throw in some latest buzz words like deep learning, deep tech and AI and the deal is done.

I recently came across a "co-living" aka new age speak for PG Accomodation startup that bought a software company to "harness their deep tech and AI offerings to optimize co-living and food court operations". Seriously? This startup is funded with crores from a PE fund! When you hear the phrase "deep tech" you would think they were building a quantum computer but they are literally selling chai samosas:Frustrati

Who cares? I am happy as long as I see their name on Indian cricket teams chest or getting popular internationally after this year football world cup.

Unfortunately, many do care about it- There are many not so well to do families who are pressured by the sales team to buy overpriced garbage courses, else threatening them with lost opportunities for their child, while promising a refund but never giving one after paying through a personal loan. And all these parents wanted to do was to give a chance to their children to escape from their pitiable conditions.

A person I know was involved in dealing with customers who want a refund (within the 14 day period) and his actual job was to delay it as much as possible to avoid giving the refund.

Another person I know was in the sales team who was encouraged by his superiors to blatantly lie and threaten parents to sell them these useless courses.

The whole company culture is toxic. If anything, this is bad PR for the Indian tech market as it's glorifying bull shit.

Exactly. An ethical business shouldn't do this, but ethics and new age startups don't seem to mix.

This reminds me of the 90's when teachers went about selling encyclopaedias to unsuspecting parents, who then bought them through a personal loan. Most of these books were never touched. Byju's is old wine in a new bottle.

And that my friend is the biggest worry. We don't need to celebrate another Adam Neuman. We much rather celebrate the likes of Sridhar Vembu.

I do wish that all companies do well and provide meaningful services and employment. However given all that we know about Byjus, I cringe at the thought of thousands of entrepreneurs motivated to follow Byjus footsteps just because an impression is created that the brand is celebrated at the largest and widest arenas in the world and it's worth emulating.

Looking at all these valuations & white collar ponzi schemes, I'm reminded of the "greater fool theory" : invest in something only because you hope there'll be a greater fool who invests more in the future.

A lot has been said here about this whole ‘startup’ thing. And a great deal of what we see, is truly lamentable.

(There is a very funny and satirical spoof video on startups and VC funding and all, by Danish Sait, doing the rounds on WhatsApp.)

However, it would not be right to tar all startups with the same brush. There are quite a few out there, which are founded on traditional values coupled with immense intelligence and ability and who have always had an eye to building and creating sustainable measurable value for their customers and thus creating long term value for the investors, employees and other stake holders.

But it is essential to remain humble and focussed on the core and not get led away by all the glitz and glamour and temptation that is rife. This takes maturity in leadership and irrespective of anything, these desirable traits are mostly found in founders who have been a part of building something solid in their earlier corporate lives.

Speaking from my own personal experience here:

When I was preparing for my government exams a couple of years ago, I made the mistake of thinking about Byjus and other edtech startups. Extremely commercial and a pro at fooling kids about how their life will be after UPSC or SSC exams, quite a shameful tactic IMHO. The fees that they were charging after a so called "scholarship" were also totally atrocious, no wonders they have evaluations like they do.

Long story short, I decided to take in-person coaching classes and was able to clear the exams in literally 30-40% of the money they were asking for, that is the day I realized that these people regardless of the image that they have created for themselves are con-men when it comes to this stream of their business.

I echo your thoughts.

He know one thing for sure - getting funding, funding and only funding.

He knows what to do?, but the gross missing piece is that he do not know why are they doing it. The purpose seems to be just valuation and valuation only not how to help the education.

The schools are open now, the parents like me are much more comfortable with our school teachers than Byju's method of learning through acting.

Initially when they started the business few years back, i thought its quite novel way to get concepts clear but i found my kids are more comfortable with the school teachers and denied to refer the subscription which i have bought for them through Byju's. I believe this is a market wide phenomena for the EdTech companies, now they have to work much harder to get the sales hence the cash burn. I saw Byju's so called sales guys everywhere now in malls, waiting outside schools and even in kids toy shops like Hamleys.

Come on! Don't be critical of them like this. Please note that not just cricket/football sponsorships, they are also doing social service by feeding poor celebrities like Shah Rukh, Mahesh babu, Sudeep, Mohanlal, P V Sindhu, Neeraj Chopra etc. I read that even local coaching institutes pay 50L-1Cr Rupees to toppers to put their picture in ads.

Few kids in my neighborhood/circle are preparing for JEE and Civil services exams and attending some coaching classes. They are all in 7-9 th class. What should I tell their parents? I tried to put some sense to one parent and they insulted me in return. Parents are crazy and these startups, coaching centers takes full advantages of them. If anything can be done, it is by the government, especially in sectors like education.